Archive » May 7, 2009

POLICE BLOTTER

A deputy on routine patrol of Highway
154 observed a car speeding. After the car was pulled over, the Santa Maria
driver only had his Mexican national photo identification card and an expired
provincial Mexican driver’s license. He was unable to provide proof of
registration for the car. The man was cited and he and his wife were released.
The registered owner of the car arrived to pick it up.

May
3

Not a happy camper

Two deputies were dispatched to Cachuma
Lake after a report of an intoxicated man threatening and hitting other
campers. After deputies arrived, the suspect’s wife told them her husband was
belligerent.

She said he had been challenging other
campers to fight and even punched some of them. The camp party was so
distraught, it was packing up to leave. A park ranger told deputies the Santa
Barbara man was no longer allowed in the park and needed to leave.

Deputies arrested the man for public
intoxication. During a search of the man, a deputy found $1,220 cash in his
wallet and marijuana and a pipe in his pants pocket. The man had a medicinal
marijuana card and requested the money be given to his wife. Once in custody,
the man threatened to punch the deputy in the face. He was booked in the Lompoc
jail.

May
2

Unlicensed driving

A Salinas man was pulled over at Highway
154 and Armor Ranch Road for speeding and having his license plate covered by
an orange sticker. He then admitted to being an unlicensed driver. The man was
cited and released and the vehicle was towed.

Domestic disturbance

Deputies were dispatched to a home in
Los Olivos after receiving a call about a domestic disturbance. The husband
appeared slightly drunk and said he did not threaten or become violent in any
way.

He said he would not argue with his wife
any more that night. The wife said they had been arguing a lot over the past
few months, and she told her husband she would call law enforcement if it
continued.

The deputies left, although they
returned again less than an hour later. The wife said her husband continued to
yell at her. At the deputies’ request, the husband agreed to spend the night at
a motel. A counselor arrived to speak with the wife.

May
1

Tinted windshield

A Lompoc man was pulled over at Alisal
and Mission in Solvang for having a tinted front windshield and excessive
hanging objects from the rearview mirror. The man admitted to being an
unlicensed driver. He was cited and released and the car was towed.

Drug use

While on Alisal Road in Solvang, a
deputy noticed a driver fail to yield to oncoming traffic. When he pulled the
Ballard driver over, the deputy noticed the man’s strange appearance and
behavior. The driver said he was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol, but
the deputy conducted some field tests anyway.

The man did not pass the tests, and then
he admitted to taking two Vicodin pills about 10 days earlier. He later said he
also took a Vicodin that day, but retracted that statement and said he had
taken two Zanax, instead.

He continued on to say he was taking
prescription pills he bought from “random people” in Santa Barbara on various
dates.

Another deputy searched the man’s car
and discovered a used hypodermic syringe wrapped in a T-shirt.

The Ballard man claimed it wasn’t his,
though the deputy saw fresh puncture wounds on the insides of his elbows. The
man later said he did inject a substance, though he would not say what, and
admitted to using black tar heroin in the past. He was cited and released. Later,
the man’s urine sample came back positive for opiate and benzodiazepine
metabolites.

April
30

Hit and run

A woman living on Fir Street in Solvang
reported a hit-and-run accident. She said she was at home when she heard a car
drive by followed by a loud thump. She went outside to investigate and
discovered the driver side rearview mirror on her car was broken. The deputy
took several photographs and gave her a case number.

Suicide and death threats

A clinical psychologist called deputies
because her patient made several suicide threats during a therapy session. When
deputies arrived at the patient’s home in Santa Ynez, they learned the suspect
also made death threats to his wife.

The wife told deputies her husband has
been using methamphetamine for 20 years and is an alcoholic. He was seeing the
psychologist for his drug and alcohol abuse. The wife said she did not want to
press charges.

No California license

A deputy pulled over a Solvang man on Viborg
Road for a rolling stop at a stop sign. The exhaust system on the car had also
been modified to produce amplified sound. The driver had an expired Mexican
driver’s license and said though he had been living in California for five
years, he was unable to obtain a California license. He was cited and released
and the car was towed.

April 28

Suspect
with gun

Deputies responded in Santa Ynez to a report of suspicious
circumstances. A woman and her nephew live in a house with separate entrances.
The woman said an unknown man came to the house asking for someone named Eddie.

The woman said no one lived there by that name. The man
asked about the other part of the house, and the woman said her nephew lived
there but he was not named Eddie and he wasn’t at home. The suspect said, “I
think I’ll go in anyway,” pulled a handgun, and entered the nephew’s bedroom.
He looked around and then left the house.

The woman’s neighbor later told deputies another man
approached him while walking and asked if the neighbor knew where Eddie was.
The neighbor said he did not know anyone by that name. The man got in a car and
left.

April 21

It’s
always a friend’s needle

Deputies pulled over a vehicle on Highway 246 in Solvang for
having amplified exhaust sound. The Santa Ynez driver agreed to a vehicle
search saying, “Yeah man, that’s no problem. There’s nothing in there.”
Although deputies did not find any illegal items on the driver or his Buellton
passenger, they did find a hypodermic syringe and needle in the passenger’s
backpack.

The passenger said his friends left the syringe at his house
and he forgot he put it in his backpack to be properly disposed of at another
time. He admitted to using syringes a few years ago when he had a
methamphetamine addiction, but he didn’t use anymore. The passenger admitted to
smoking marijuana recently. The passenger was cited and both men were released.

April 19

Trespassing
and threatening

Security personnel contacted deputies about a man refusing
to leave the casino. Apparently, the bus driver for the casino would not let
the man, a transient, on the bus because he did not have a Chumash Players
Card. Security arrived, at which point the man challenged them to a fight,
saying, “Come on, let’s fight it out.” Security handcuffed the man until
deputies arrived. The man had bleeding cuts on parts of his body that security
said he had before they arrived.

The man appeared drunk. A
records check on him revealed he had some outstanding warrants for public
intoxication and battery and theft. While transporting the man back to the
Santa Barbara jail, a deputy noticed the man talking to himself as if three
people were in the backseat with him. He’d ask himself questions and answer
them in a different voice.